Suggestion for next ESM freight car

[bbussey]

The X58 decorated for MILW sold surprisingly well, much stronger than the Burlington Northern cars and the Burlington cars from a few years ago.  It is a foob but the Milwaukee prototype is extremely close to the Pennsylvania prototype, just minor differences.  We will revisit it in the future.

[wcfn100]

Interesting note, that New Haven PS1 is the relatively rare 10'0" inside height version.

They did have a lot of the 10' IH cars, but that's not one of them.

Here's a 10' car.  You can see the top most rib isn't there.

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Jason

[Missaberoad]

They did have a lot of the 10' IH cars, but that's not one of them.
Jason

  Brain fart moment... I saw the missing stiffners on the end and glossed over the small Murphy rib still being there. 

Still an interesting very early car.

[sirenwerks]

how about some West Coast love?

Like a Gunderson 7466 wood chip gon...

[wazzou]

Brain fart moment... I saw the missing stiffners on the end and glossed over the small Murphy rib still being there. 

Still an interesting very early car.

And that the car side data says 10-6.      

[OldEastRR]

Interesting note, that New Haven PS1 is the relatively rare 10'0" inside height version. Would make an interesting model with a few owners (NH, DLW, B&O, AC&Y, DRGW, LV, TPW, PH&D, LNAC, CNW (possibly more second hand owners)

Yeah, I liked the look of those short NH PS-1s so I chopped down an MTL car to match the dimensions. The interesting part was tho they had PS build it lower, they still had a standard PS door on the car -- a door designed for the 10'6" car. Which explains the extension below the door opening (not seen in the 2nd picture) to accommodate the door's lower track. I assume that means the floor was a few inches higher than the door track.

So I wound up with an MTL PS-1 with a LOWER roofline than an Atlas PS-1. Funny.

[wcfn100]

Yeah, I liked the look of those short NH PS-1s so I chopped down an MTL car to match the dimensions. The interesting part was tho they had PS build it lower, they still had a standard PS door on the car -- a door designed for the 10'6" car. Which explains the extension below the door opening (not seen in the 2nd picture) to accommodate the door's lower track. I assume that means the floor was a few inches higher than the door track.

So I wound up with an MTL PS-1 with a LOWER roofline than an Atlas PS-1. Funny.

I don't believe any of this to be correct.

You can easily see the top door panel is shorter on a 10' car than a 10'6" car.



And the 'extension' is no different between the two cars.



Jason

[SD452XR]

The X58 decorated for MILW sold surprisingly well, much stronger than the Burlington Northern cars and the Burlington cars from a few years ago.  It is a foob but the Milwaukee prototype is extremely close to the Pennsylvania prototype, just minor differences.  We will revisit it in the future.

Glad to hear. Will pick up more Milwaukee road cars if more numbers are done.

[unittrain]

It would be great to.see ESM offer the X65 in HO.

[Jim Costello]

Something we have not had for decades is a proper  1940s/50s era 40' flat car or 40' gondola. If was based on a New Haven model than all there better.

Jim  NHRHTA #L082
Modelling the NH down under

[thomasjmdavis]

Something we have not had for decades is a proper  1940s/50s era 40' flat car or 40' gondola. If was based on a New Haven model than all there better.

Jim  NHRHTA #L082
Modelling the NH down under

I have no idea what the NH prototypes for those would look like, but a 40' flatcar with some weight in it (the ones I have are nearly gravity defying Red Caboose- from kits, I think) would be welcome. And I would be a very likely customer for untold numbers of  low-side 8 panel steel gondolas and/or composite gondolas and/or rebuilt gondolas that look like this-
https://prototopics.blogspot.com/2019/12/chicago-eastern-illinois-gondola.html

[cjm413]

I have no idea what the NH prototypes for those would look like, but a 40' flatcar with some weight in it (the ones I have are nearly gravity defying Red Caboose- from kits, I think) would be welcome. And I would be a very likely customer for untold numbers of  low-side 8 panel steel gondolas and/or composite gondolas and/or rebuilt gondolas that look like this-
https://prototopics.blogspot.com/2019/12/chicago-eastern-illinois-gondola.html

That might be a good project for an otherwise useless 40' 8 panel gon with ride height issues...

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[thomasjmdavis]

That might be a good project for an otherwise useless 40' 8 panel gon with ride height issues...

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Yeah, I have been looking at doing something like that for several variations of the gondolas.  But no Bachmann.  The 6" diameter rivet heads are just not worth it.  But some of the 40-50 year old European tooling is actually much better and might provide a starting point.  For the original composite GS gondolas that C&EI had (and were the fodder for all the later rebuilds), I've thought about trying to re-work a Fine N Scale Caswell, but the end and door hardware mods would be extensive, so starting from scratch might be easier.

Anyway, I don't really expect Bryan to invest the tens of thousands of his own hard earned money to tool these particular C&EI gondolas for mass production. He did produce those ACL low-side kits a few years ago,  I assume he did it that way specifically because he had already assessed the market for similar cars, and it wasn't a viable candidate for high volume production for ESM. But I do note that the basic Howe truss pattern is common to C&EI and AT&SF, and I am willing to bet that it is not uncommon among the other railroads.  So, who knows, maybe we will see Bluford do for gondolas what they have done for 2 bay hoppers, or maybe Fine-N-Scale or another resin caster will see an opportunity.

[bbussey]

Gondolas in general do not sell that well in N for some reason unfortunately.  We have the mill gondola, which checks that box for us, so there would be a number of models we would tool before tooling another gondola.  We will be tooling the new sides and brake appliances for the model which will cost as much as tooling a new truck frame, so it's worth the cost.  We won't be producing anywhere near as many gons as we did the first time around, so that will help as well.

Flat cars aren't much better in N demand-wise, which probably is one reason we haven't seen an F30 or F30D.  Not too many manufacturers have more than one gondola or flatcar model aside from variants.

[sd45elect2000]

I have 5 of the ESM Mill gons, I don't know if that qualifies me as a good customer or not? In addition I have three of the Made in America low side gons.

I would buy more flat cars and gondola's I  think the selling secret for open top cars is to provide a load for them. With the ESM gondola's that I have I provided them with Hay Brothers loads. They look great but it was an additional cost.

There are a lot of what I call one off cars to fit my 1949 era that I still want. These are cars like wooden tank cars for vinegar and whatnot. Poultry cars are another. I don't want dozens of these cars but a few of each would be nice.

I am also looking for more variety in my tank car fleet as my primary car is the 1927 ACF car from intermountain. I know at one point Bryan was looking to issue the Hooker acid car, I would get a half dozen of these.

I think the ESM kits are a great idea, I hope to see many more of them !!

As far as a mass produced model I don't have a clue.